Manufacturing Consensus

Understanding Propaganda in the Era of Automation and Anonymity

By: Samuel Woolley

Narrated by: Lloyd James

Length: 6 hrs and 54 mins

Publisher's summary

An in-depth exploration of social media and emergent technology that details the inner workings of modern propaganda

Until recently, propaganda was a top-down, elite-only system of communication control used largely by state actors. Today, as Samuel Woolley argues, social media has democratized propaganda, allowing nearly anyone to launch a fairly sophisticated, computationally enhanced, propaganda campaign. Woolley shows how social media, with its anonymity and capacity for automation, allows political groups to create the illusion of popularity through computational tools (such as bots) and human-driven efforts (such as sockpuppets—real people assuming false identities online—and partisan nano-influencers) and then either create a bandwagon effect by bringing the content into parallel discussions with other legitimate users, or mold discontent for political purposes.

Drawing on eight years of original international ethnographic research among the people who build, combat, and experience these propaganda campaigns, Woolley presents an extensive view of the evolution of computational propaganda, offers a glimpse into the future, and suggests pragmatic responses for policy makers, academics, technologists, and others.

©2023 Samuel Woolley (P)2023 Blackstone Publishing

Insightful and Entertaining

When i saw that this was academic literature i braces myself for dry and boring listening. But not only was this very informative, it was actually well written and fun to listen too. I feel like in todays landscape of information sharing and dissemination, this should be required reading for all high schoolers.